James Blake wins Mercury Music Prize

Singer James Blake has won this year's Barclaycard Mercury Prize with his second album, 'Overgrown'. The Mercury prize is a U.K. award given to less-mainstream artists.

The Mercury Prize, for the best British or Irish album of the year, was handed out this week at the Roundhouse venue in north London. The winner was the 25/1 outsider, James Blake. Other nominees were David Bowie, Jake Bugg, Discolsure, Foals, Jon Hopkins, Laura Marling, Laura Mvula, Rudimental, The Savages, and Villagers.

Blake, aged 25, is an English electronic music producer and singer-songwriter from London. He has released two albums. The first, self-titled 'James Blake', charted at #9 in the U.K. and #123 in the U.S. This year's follow-up, 'Overgrown', also reached the U.K. top-ten at #8 and performed better in the U.S., reaching #32. The albums have yet to chart in Canada.

On its release, 'Overgrown' received widespread critical acclaim. At Metacritic, which assigns a rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 82, based on 40 reviews, which indicates "universal acclaim".

On receiving the award, Blake told The Independent: "I feel jubilant and confused, wonderful. It's a moment you don't expect to happen to you, in fact you might even bet against it if you're British."